Potty Training

Potty training is never funny when you are actually going through it. Cleaning “accidents” off the carpet. Scraping poo off the panties. But when you take the time to look back, there are certainly more than a few good laughs. Although my oldest daughter’s tale is too disgusting to repeat, my youngest daughter’s is a story of sheer will power. For about six months she would repeat to me every day, “I will go pee pee on the potty when I’m three”. So five days before her third birthday I began a countdown. “Guess what? In five days you get to pee on the potty!” I continued this until the day before her birthday. Then when she woke up on her third birthday, she walks in my room and says she changed her mind. She wanted to keep her diaper. Now I’ve read all the articles telling moms to just let their kids tell you when they are ready, but I just knew she could do it. She hadn’t even wet her diaper at night in over a year. So a few days after her third birthday, I decided we would start potty training.

The day started like every other day. She woke up with a dry diaper. But this time, I immediately took off her diaper and put her on her toddler potty. I told her today she was going to become a big girl. She sat on the potty for about ten minutes and began to complain that she wanted breakfast. So against my better judgment, I let my naked daughter go down to the breakfast table. After a quick bowl of cereal, back to the potty she went. She sat and sat and sat and sat….. We read stories. We sang songs. We colored. We argued. By 11:30, she still hadn’t gone potty. Now remember she woke up with a dry diaper. She hasn’t gone potty for about 16 ½ hours and she is hurting. I continued to give her positive encouragement and reassurance that she could get off the potty as soon as she went. Right about now, however, I’m starting to second guess my strategy. She is crying because it hurts, but she refuses to go. She is so stubborn that at 12:30 when a little bit gets by, she is able to stop the flow (how many of you out there could do that?). She looks at me and sees my excitement. “Mommy!!! It didn’t hurt!” And with that…she let it all go. My little baby continued to pee for the next five minutes. She nearly filled the entire toddler’s potty! Despite all her stubbornness, from that day on, she has never had an accident!  Do you have a funny potty training story to tell? I am always ready for a good laugh!

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